


Hope Against the Hours

by WizbangBonanza



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: But is she really dead?, F/M, Gen, i mean i guess it's character death bc Rose is gone?, i'm a dumb crying nerd, idk - Freeform, pretty dramatic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-11
Updated: 2015-05-11
Packaged: 2018-03-22 09:23:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,519
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3723655
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WizbangBonanza/pseuds/WizbangBonanza
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They had hope that maybe Steven had inherited his mother’s traits, perhaps he could be the heir-no- reincarnation of everything his mother once was.</p>
<p>Only he wasn’t.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hope Against the Hours

When Steven was born, the Gems had mourned the ( _death? disappearance? loss?-_ ) absence of their leader.

Spending the day in their separate alcoves of the temple, they counted the hours that passed since they last saw Rose.

After one hour passed, they could still pretend that maybe Rose was simply in another room, busy making a whole universe from clouds. After five hours, they could still pretend that maybe Rose was on a mission to save life on this godforsaken planet, being the kind person they’ve known her to be.  After twelve hours, they pretended that they hadn’t seen Greg at all that day and maybe Rose was only spending the day with him.

 But after twenty four hours…

Forty eight…

Seventy two…

Despite the several millennia the Gems had been alive, and their seemingly immortal life span, they felt that this passage of time without Rose was **killing** them.

They wondered if this was what every human felt; the slow passage of time eating away at their very essence.

 Unbearable.

After a week, they finally realized that Rose wasn’t going to be coming back. 

And that hit them **hard**.

There was sobbing, begging, anger bubbling up from their gems where their souls were contained.

Pearl had cried the most. She teared at the littlest things; something as simple as a particular t-shirt or something in the fridge could send her sobbing. Every little memory reminded her of what once was and what was no longer. Rose was the first one who called her special but with her gone Pearl felt herself deteriorate. How could someone as weak as her ever be the strong, important person that Rose thought she was?  After Amethyst yelled at her for crying so much, she stayed in her gem for weeks.

Amethyst felt the most anger, intent in destroying everything in the temple that made her seemed to hurt her. Rose had always been there for her even though she was the freak amongst them: the wild Earth gem. But now that she was gone, Amethyst couldn't get the feeling Rose **left** her rather than that Rose died. After an incident in Rose’s room, it was decided it would be best for her to release her rage elsewhere for awhile and so she left the temple. Later, they found out that she went back to the Kindergarten for those days.

Garnet was the most unresponsive. She spent days standing in the same way emotionlessly staring at the same place, eyes unblinking, uncomprehending whatever prophetic visions came to her. Rose had always led her when she didn't know what to do. Everything seemed clearer when she was there to guide Garnet. Without her, although she was never alone, Garnet still felt lost, weaving through the rivers of could be's and could've been's. Her usually selective silence was demoted to a non-negotiable mute. She was the only one who stayed in the temple but it hardly mattered whether she was there or not. 

After the hope died with those hours, despair crawled its way into the crevices of their hearts as they looked back at the past and what was.

After they had been unresponsive for four months, Greg had had enough.

Before she-uh- moved on, Rose had made each of the Gems promise one thing; protect this planet and most of all protect Steven. Of course the Gems had promised her that. Who could deny their wonderful, brilliant, compassionate, perfect leader her dying wish? They couldn’t refuse, even if they wanted to.

They agreed to this promise and had stayed during the labor right up until Rose had vanished. Turning to the child, they had hope that maybe if Steven had inherited his mother’s traits, perhaps he could be the heir-no- reincarnation of everything his mother once was.

Only he wasn’t. 

As soon as they saw him, they reeled back and their hope vanished as Rose had done. His hair, while curly, was of black tar, his eyes, though full of wonder, was just like his dad’s, his body, although possessed a gem, was organic. He was Rose’s son but he was also someone else’s, a _human’s_.

While he was, in many ways, alike to Rose, he wasn’t _her_. He could never _replace_ her. He would never _be_  like her. 

They departed and Greg had yet to see them make due on their deal. 

But he wasn’t going to let them break their promise.

He might not have known about alien Gem stuff, but he knew that they would never want to let Rose down.

He’d tried once to make them see sense to which they replied with anger (Amethyst), cold dismissal (Garnet), and shame (Pearl). This human thought he could take away their beloved leader-no-friend, their best friend, the one that was always there for them; he thought he could order the Gems around as if he was higher on Rose’s social hierarchy; he thought he could make them love their abomination just like they had loved Rose-no. Rose may have seen the beauty in everything but wasn’t going to happen.

They could see no beauty in this. 

Greg could sorta see it that way. He could always get a pretty good read on people. He empathized, sympathized. He didn’t know what it was like to be an immortal alien who’d seen their other immortal alien friend all but die because they got involved with a dumb human like him. He could understand how that was rough. 

He was just about to give up until a sound erupted from the back of his van. He couldn’t fit a crib into his van but from a careful swaddle of blankets in the relatively clean trunk another giggle bubbled up from his son’s chest. He bent over and brushed the curls from his son’s hair, and saw the stars in his eyes as he saw his father and tickled his gem embedded stomach. 

But most of all, he marveled at his son’s laugh and how it was so so so much like his mother’s.

Determination burning in his eyes, Greg swooped and held a blinking Steven, laughing at his father’s antics, and Greg marched his way into the temple. Son in arms, he miraculously found all the Gems together for once, faces still solemn.

He slammed open the door and the Gems’ eyes darted over to him, itching for a fight, a distraction, but then turning disappointed at the human who stole their friend away.

They all looked at each other, mentally fighting to see who’s turn it was to drive him away. It was decided to be Pearl’s. She bitterly grumbled as she was forced to approach him while the others stood close enough to throw him up if backup was needed but not close enough for Greg to talk to them.

 “Greg, what do you want, now? We’ve already told you to keep away from the Temple! We are not going to-“ He stopped Pearl by shoving his son, in swaddling blankets, into her arms.

“Listen!”

She was so surprised that she almost dropped the boy. When she realized what it was, she didn’t flinch but her face twitched. And then it turned cold.

“Why is it here? We don’t wANT HIM HERE AND WE CERTAINLY DON’T WANT YOU HERE AND I AM NOT GOING TO LISTEN TO A WEAK, INSIGNIFICANT, STUPID HU-“ She was interrupted for the second time that day but not by Greg.

She turned in shock to the stupidly happy smile of a laughing baby, giggle after giggle birthed from a chest bubbling with mirth.

It was _her_ laugh.

And it was absolutely **beautiful**.

The same snorting, chest earthed, dorky, mirthful giggle as Rose’s. It was like she was right there laughing at the moping Gems at how silly they were.

 Amethyst and Garnet had come over, staring down at the laughing baby, eyes full of undecipherable, dumbfounded emotion.

 Pearl’s face had softened and after a few seconds of Steven giggling, tears dripped from her eyes in wonder, in relief, in a sagging sort of _unearthly_ happiness that couldn’t have sprouted from Earth but even so it could only come from a place so rich with paradoxes.

 So full of unbelievable good, and unbelievable bad. So full of unbearable beauty and unbearable ugliness. Where a weak, insignificant stupid little **human** could be with someone was incomprehensibly strong, important, brilliant, wonderful, and _breathtaking_ as Rose.

 The Gems had decided it that night that Steven would have his very own room in the Temple, active as of right then, and he would sleep in it every night while the Gems (Pearl literally) could watch him. They supposed that Greg could also sleep there for a couple of nights in-between until Steven evolved enough out of infantry. It took a few days to build but they figured it was worth it so that Steven could grow in a more human environment to fit his needs. 

All the days after, the Gems would hear Steven’s beautiful, irreplaceable laughter filling the rooms of the Temple, and they would barely stop to look back since. 

**Author's Note:**

> This was a product of the most recent episodes and my post-feelings. I am a sad, dumb, crying nerd and I deserve to be eradicated from this planet or launched into the sun or something like that. 
> 
> If you care, I'll post the next chapter to I Hunt Snakes eventually, do not you worry, my friends. It's a'coming. 
> 
> Any comments/kudos/other are welcomed and accepted graciously :)


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